Paper Prayer
by LadyLove5000
Summary: What if that summer hadn't changed everything? It's been five years and Gordy is still torn over the loss of his brother and his family. Can Chris save him in time? Slash Gordy/Chris
1. Chapter 1

I can hear the creak of footsteps echoing through the silent house

Paper Prayer

By Willa Gaia

Rated M for cussing

Disclaimer: S'all Rob Reiner and Steven King's. I'm just borrowing.

Chapter 1

I can hear the creak of footsteps echoing through the silent house. My father's nightly prowls. Like an intruder, he creeps quietly in the shadows of the hall. I know because I've seen him. I also know I have three minutes between the time that he will open the forbidden door to Denny's room, peek into the darkness, and then move to my own.

Then he'll wait. His padded slippers glare through the crack under the door and I hold my breath. Waiting.

And the door opens and he stares at my old walls, still filled with the same pictures of star baseball players, cars, clippings from the crime magazine I used to buy every week, and that one of me and Chris, grinning shoulder to shoulder on the first day of junior high.

No football trophies, no scout letters. Not even any damn girls in polka dot bikinis.

And this is when I shut my eye's tight, even though the image has been burned into the back of my eyelids.

No noise, no visible movement, but I can feel it. The blank face, the mouth widening in speech as if he was about to state some mundane and inarguable fact, like the table of elements.

"It should have been you, Gordy."

And then the door closes and I am alone and alone I cannot withhold the gasping sobs. Wet streaks of shame, of pussiness, of the ultimate testament that I am not my perfect brother Denny, pool onto my pillow.

My pillow is wet till morning.

For three seconds, the dining room in the Lachance home looks perfect. The father sits at the head of the table reading the newspaper, absently dipping his buttered toast into coffee as his eyes track back and fourth across columns of black and white. The mother bustles about as the eggs chase the bacon across the frying pan, pouring glasses of orange juice and bowls of cereal. And then the son appears, clean cut, handsome in that acceptable way, and grabs a plate.

But then the observer might notice that the father tenses as his son sits down, and angles his body slightly sideways, as if warding off some unwelcome presence, some evil. Or how carefully the mother sets about each task, as if she had forgotten how to breath and was desperately trying to remember. Trying to not bring attention to herself. Or the dark circles under the son's eyes, how he flinches at each crackle of grease in the pan, how he physically turns himself from half the table where a fourth setting would be placed. Should be placed.

There is something wrong with this family, like they are bad actors for some commercial. Imposters.

"So…son", the imposter father begins, setting down the folds of print and carefully regarding his eggs, "Did Coach Shields post the cuts for the team, yet?"

"No" Gordy reply's dully, too tired to force interest. Ignoring the food on his plate.

"You should make the cuts. You're not as good as Denny but…not hopeless. And you are a senior this year, right?"

"Something like that."

There is silence for a few seconds, the father exhaling slightly in relief for he has completed the hated task of regarding his disappointing son, staved it off for one more day.

Gordy stares at his food, and after a few minutes he decides that it has loitered for long enough on his plate. He shuttles to the trashcan and dumps it all. Neither the mother or the father look up at this gross waste of resources, as if this is some preordained ritual, and he tracks back up the stairs.

The foliage has turned brown and red and yellow with the passing of the summer months and the start of the school year. It creates a colorful carpet as Gordy vaults the forgotten bushes, chocked with new growth and decay, past the spider web draped tree house and onto the road. Castle Rock hasn't changed much in five years, the same pastel colored cars flank the main street, the shops just awakening in the bustle of early morning commerce.

A wind sweeps across the pavement, sending leaves swirling into the air. Gordy draws his jacket tighter around him, trying to hide his neck in the raised collar and his hands in the felt pockets.

"Heya Gordy!" a voice calls, slightly obscured across the lane. Jogging into view is a stretched out leaner Vern. He'd lost the baby fat but he was just as bewildered a ever and in this Gordy drew comfort. It's nice to know some things never change.

"Gordy man oh man you'll never believe it! I just found out the bossest thing!"

Gordy waited patiently as Vern caught his breath, the warmth and excitement of Vern's flushed cheeks warming him like a Christmas fire.

"Ace got released!", he stated, carefully studying Gordy's face for reaction. Gordy contemplates in silence, and Vern must have found this unsatisfactory for he continued on in a rush.

"You remember Ace doncha? Well he remembers you and word on the street is as soon as he's back he's gonna kick your ass!"

Ace has always been a very menacing member in Castle Rock society but since his arrest and incarceration at the Oregon State Penitentiary, his reputation had reached epic proportions. Even Vern, who knew Ace pretty well and whose brother ran with his gang, could have sworn that he was seven feet tall, with a pair of bull mastiffs that were comparable in size to small elephants. Even more terrifying than the infamous ball-siking Chopper. But Gordy still remembered just as clearly what an asshole Ace was, and how much he resembled a wet rat at the other end of his pistol.

"You wouldn't let him though, right?" Vern sated, glancing at Gordy's newly defined biceps. He still got a kick out of the fact that one of his friends was a football player, varsity no less. "You gotta tell me your secrets, man. I cant believe you got buff so fast."

"Uhh..yeah I gotta go pick this thing up for my mom. Mind if I catch you later?" And without waiting for a reply, Gordy set off in the opposite direction at a brisk pace. After ducking around and making sure that Vern and his constant chatter was out of sight he sort of sighed. Memories of Ace brought up memories of that summer…and memories of Denny. All of a sudden Gordy felt like he wanted to escape but no matter what direction he ran in he could never get away. Not in this town at least.

Without really thinking he turned off the pavement onto the dirt path of the surrounding landscape. Cloistered by reaching branches and drenched in green. The immortal trees that never loose their color.

It lead up a small gently inkling hill. But Gordy hadn't eaten for three days and he was gasping for breath after a few short minutes. With no particular destination in mind, he merely sat where he stood, leaning against a friendly tree and fondling the cool dirt beneath his fingers.

He would have sat there all day, even into the night perhaps had Chris not spotted him on his way to school.

"What the hell…Gordy?!" he shouted, dashing up the hill terrified for a few seconds that Gordy'd been hurt of something horrible had happened.

"Man?" Chris asked tentatively, because Gordy sat there so still and silently, so lost in thought htat he hadn't even noticed that he was no longer alone. But then Gordy shot up like he was electrocuted.

"Holy shit! You scared me! How long you been standing there?" Gordy gasped, defensively crossing his arms over his chest because he was worried what Chris might have seen or heard him say, mumbling under his breath.

"How long YOU been sitting here, lard ass? Get the hell up! Class is in like ten minutes" Chris countered, reaching out a hand to haul him up which Gordy gladly accepted.

"I don't feel like going. I cant face all those…never mind. I'm not going, alright! Get off my case." Gordy turned away, to meander through the trees Chris-less and melancholy.

Chris looked after him for a few seconds, deliberating on his next words, "Gordy. Look I heard about Ace--"

"What about him?" Gory interrupted sharply, turning to face him. The sun shone behind his head, blurring his edges slightly. "What, you thinking I'm afraid of him? Like some pansy?" he couldn't keep the roughness out of his voice, there were those memories of Denny which always seemed to be bubbling just under his throat. IN shamed he turned again to run, but as he twisted to maneuver around a tree his foot caught an embossed root and between his sleep deprived state and tear blinded edges he just curled up on the floor, wishing he could just sink into the inviting earth.

"Yeah cause you are such a pansy," Chris laughed. When Gordy failed to get up he walked over to him, kicking lightly at his side. "Kay, stop the shit. Seriously we can still make it to first period and I'm not going without you. You wouldn't want to jeopardize my education now would you?"

Gordy chuckled weakly on the ground, "thanks for the guilt trip, I really need it right now." Chris kneeled down, framing his shining face between gentle fingers,. "Yeah I really think you do…" silence for a few seconds as Chris studied his face. His brown eyes crackled with that other worldly sense that always brought goose bumps to Gordy. Chris was a god in his past life.

"If you don't haul your pansy ass up right this second I'm going to carry you I swear to Christ."

"Nooo!" Gordy whined, trying to hit him and totally missing him.

"Right" Christ grunted, and slipping his arms around Gordy hauled him up fireman style.

"Damn I don't remember you being so bony—and so light! Are you a freak or something?"

"Jerk" Gordy accused, kicking him enough to get Chris to drop him gently on the ground. IN a slightly dejected voice he continued seriously, "Please don't make me go."

In that moment, Chris didn't know what was wrong with him, but he knew that he couldn't leave him alone for a moment because there was something missing from his eyes. That lively spark that was so beautiful when they were kids and that had been gradually, heartbreakingly fading since his family fell apart.

He stood up, thinking seriously, when his face broke into a wide grin.

"Wanna go fishing?"

A/N: So I'm defiantly going to hell for this story. To take a perfectly wholesome innocent coming of age meathead story and turn it into some slashy mushy emo disgrace defiantly deserves at least the seventh level. So read read read and review because hell's just a big dance floor with no air conditioning :DD


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

Every time Cindy Collin's opens her big, fat, glossy, pink lips; Chris gets the inexplicable urge to slam his fist into her face. He imagines his fist curling, raising from under the table, and than WHAM! And out of the shocked silence, the clouds of white powder and foundation that would swirl above her prone form on the ground, scattered applause would be heard. Louder and louder it would grow as thousands of appreciative fans would appear out of nowhere. The entire cheerleading team, the chess club, the puny little assistant principal, all would rise to their feet, raising their exaltations to the heavens as they carried off their hero into the glorious sunset.

But even in Oregon hitting your girlfriend in blatant public is not exactly acceptable. So that little golden future would stay behind the locked doors of Chris's fantasy world, and he'd continue to nod in interest at Cindy's insipid vacuous waste of breath, adjusting his arm a little from around her waist.

None of Chris's friends really understood why Cindy started eating with them. One day Ace and his gang were the Czars of Castle Rock High, taking field trips from their mailbox baseball to slouch into class and remind everyone who was boss. Back when Chris and his gang were bottomfeeders. And then time shifted and they weren't fashionably rebellious anymore, just deadbeats, and the school social circles replaced them with Chris and his gang and people like Cindy, who don't recognize faces so much as face value, started hanging around.

Could Chris say no to the world on a silver platter?

Vern doesn't care, he just eats his pudding, stealing glances at Cindy's boobs, which are much more satisfactory than anyone from the Mickey Mouse Club. Teddy is too caught up in his own insanity, his desperate plans to get into the army, to really notice anything. And even when he's not pretending to eat food, Gordy, his best friend, doesn't say much at all.

It's cold and lonely on top of the mountain.

"Hellllllooooo!!" Cindy whined, jerking Chris out of his happy place, "Christopher!! You are not even paying attention!!"

"Wha.??" He replied, slightly dazed.

"I have a joke." Teddy interrupts, that crazy grin domineering his face, which looks all crooked with his ear missing. "What do you call a woman with two black eyes?"

Cindy snorts in disgust. "Why do you have such…vulgar friends? None of Ace's friends were so rude around my sister."

Even deadbeats, crooks who lied and cheated on their girlfriends, had the decency to not say vulgar jokes.

"You don't have to say a word, she's already been told twice." Teddy finished triumphantly. Teddy was doomed to fifteen dollar hookers and empty pool halls.

He grinned as Cindy grimaced, somewhere in her instinctual make up her limited sense of feminism just cried out feebly in rage.

"Wanna go for a ride?" Vern offers awkwardly.

"Yes, please!" Cindy smiles prettily, instantly gratified that despite all of Chris's shortcomings, he still had friends who had cars. Now she remembers why she puts up with Teddy and the weirdo nobody friend Gordy, the disappointing little brother of the football player that her older sister used to be obsessed with in middle school. They only look alike kind of.

She rushed off, gotta go to the bathroom to make sure her make up is perfect in case anyone important see's her through the dusty tint of Vern's passenger side window.

"Gordy? Coming?" Chris asked delicately. Gordy looked up, his eyes slightly gazed. He hasn't been sleeping well either.

"Sure…sure" He replys, not really sure why he the only one left at the table or if this bothers him at all. Chris's vision tracks between Cindy's impatient face and Gordy's listless one.

"See ya, then," Chris sighs. Because it's nice to be wanted.

With everyone gone, Gordy didn't really feel the need to pretend anymore, so he grabbed all his stuff and moved off to the sloping lawn outside. It's sunny out and a few years ago him and Chris would have skipped class and gone fishing.

He can feel all the eyes on his back and he knows what there saying, he's not stupid. Some sigh with pity. Poor little Gordy, the poor LeChance's. Denny really was the greatest football player ever, wasn't he? And others frown in disgust. Yeah that sucks, you lost one of the most important people in your life, but seriously man, that was five years ago. Like his greif was old news. Like greif has a shelf life. People like that have never known loss. They should have seen Ray Browers pale corpse, his glassy unseeing eyes.

A/N: Kay so I've got to go read seven chapters of Scarlett Letter t so this is as far as I'm going to get in one night. Still, I was wondering if anyone could give any advice as to whether this seems to dark or not? I'm reading Fight Club at the mo' and I'm not sure if darker elements are okay? Or if they are too intense….feedback would be mucho appreciated. 


	3. Chapter 3

And now, folks, we return to the harrowing adventures of Gordy LeChance, aka EMO BOY!!!

It's raining outside. The torrents of water pound the sidewalk and pelt against the windows of the neighborhood. It's a testament to human ingenuity, as people pull their drapes across the glass and settle in with blankets and hot chocolate, maybe roasting marshmallows over the cheerily crackling fires. And a few million years ago these humans would have been sheltering under trees or in cold drafty caves. And in all this incredible progress, these amazing feats of time and space, Gordy cannot drag himself out of bed.

He's a little mad at himself because on the fourth day he finally gave in and nibbled on a few saltine crackers. And then some chocolate chip cookies. And then an entire bag of chips and salsa. And now he sits cross legged on his twin bed with a jar of jelly, peanut butter, two slices of wonder bread, a knife, and a big ol' pot of pity cause he couldn't even successfully starve himself to death. He even failed at that.

But a body can only focus on being depressed and moany for so long, so naturally when the phone rang and Chris was on the other line, he totally forgot to be all sad and despondent and eagerly agreed to head over and help him study for a math test.

Stowing all the evidence under his bed, as if anyone would notice, and wrapping his sandwich in a paper napkin, Gordy threw his book bag over one shoulder and started down the staircase. The house was deadly silent, Mr. Lachance was off probably torturing baby animals, or whatever it is heartless assholes do with their time, and Mrs. Lachance sat staring out the open window, with the paisley curtains flapping slightly in the wind, a cold coffee cup clutched in one hand.

She didn't turn around. He didn't even bother to say goodbye.

Just another happy little American family.

Chris sat, perched upon his bunk bead, with a piece of homework in one hand and a thoroughly confused expression on his face. Gordy closed the door behind him, to block out the loud obnoxious game show host dancing on the comatose Mr. Chamber's television.

"How's it goin', buddy ol' pal?" Gordy asked happily, straddling a desk chair and adjusting his tee-shirt.

"Wow, you seem so....not a whiney little bitch" Chris replied, a grin cracking his jaw as he looked his friend over. Gordy seemed less hagard, which took a huge weight off his chest.

"Ummm...thanks? Right, so geometry."

"Yeah, something like that."

They worked through the problems, which Chris seemed to understand pretty easily which made Gordy wonder if he had only asked him over to watch him. But then again he could just be paranoid. And he had so few friends left, it didn't really matter either way.

Needless to say the study session didn't take much time, which left them several hours to sit around, Gordy skirting away from any telling questions, the following awkward silence, and five or so minutes to stare at the cracks in the ceiling.

For some weird reason, Gordy thought back to how he had read once that Gandhi used to purposefully sleep with women. Even in the nude, just to prove to himself that he was better than his body, that he could defeat anything, including lust. But then again, Gandhi was like from a 100 years ago, and had Jesus status, and was like...Indian. And of course those details are very relevant to our pondering hero.

He wondered if Gandhi could have maintained his resolution if he had been around Chris Chambers. Who had like...a perfect swimmers body, and a nicely defined six pack, and really pretty eyes and...what the hell? Where did that come from?

Gordy shook his head physically, like his less than red blooded manly thoughts were just stray cobwebs he could shake loose.

Like, he had always had what he considered to be a healthy respect and envy for his best friend's body. While he had gotten skinnier and punier looking, Chris had grown muscles like he was inflating them illegally and had plenty of admirers for each one, even forgetting Cindy Collins. Which was hard to do. But healthy respect and envy for his best friend didn't spread to his eye color, or whether or not his eyes happened to be pretty. Or even imagining that certain icons of civil rights history would have some sort of homosexual appreciation for him.

Thats not normal, right? Yeah...definitely far into not normal land.

He tried to sum up some picture of a girl in his mind. Soft breasts and curves are supposed to be sexy, right? But no one really came to mind. The females he saw everyday were definitely unappealing. His mother was female and represented most of the female community in Castle Rock, at least to Gordy's mind, and he definitely didn't want to be involved in a relationship past passing the sugar bowl with his mother and anyone like her.

So what did that mean? What was left.

Now Gordy started to seriously grow concerned. Chris had a girlfriend, even freaken Vern had some squeeze, if only the fruit of being an extension of Chris's popularity, but he was totally blank when it came to the girl population of Castle Rock.

And Chris...what did that even mean?

Gordy picked up his bag in a sweaty hand and turned to Chris mumbling some excuse about an English project that was due the following day. Chris seemed unconvinced but figured that it was enough for a day that Gordy had even voluntarily left his house. You have to take these things in small steps, he figured, like teaching someone how to walk again.

A/N:

OMG!! This site is so frustrating!! GAHHH!!

And the exact stress I need just before my chem final!!! Thanks, life. Oh well. So just so you know, wary, lost, confused, or amused reader, a lot of work went into this chapter and a lot of hours that should have been spent memorizing polyatomic ions, or some such trite. Just in case you were offended or something... that it's so short. All I know is I is exhuasted! But ya know, it's what we stupid idiots do for our art :DD


	4. Chapter 4

A/N: Okay SCREW polyatomic ions! Seriously, in a world where you can receive hateful facebook mail from the crazed fiancée of your ex boyfriend (and it's like you're marrying a poor 19 year old doofus you ho!! you couldnt even wait till he finished Navy School or whatever the hell that is??) and you're the bad guy??? Top of the fuckery to ya, mr. polyatomic ion.

So... The Big Chapter 4...You know you're excited! :D

All in all, Ace felt satisfied, as he gripped the Bowey knife in his hand, that the order of things was finally going to return, all normal and rightwise. Some pretty screwed up crap had occurred that fateful day five years ago, probably caused by consumption of alcohol or some skewed judgement, and he'd be the first to admit that it was probably on his part, that allowed some pathetic loser barely adolescents to outwit him like that.

But he'd changed since then. Regrouped, if you will. He'd acquired a few more tattoos, probably some strange and socially uncouth diseases from the not so lady-ful ladies of Oregon State Penitentiary, and a new outlook on life.

If our villain had ever picked up any reading material in his life, besides the Sadists guide to Screwing with People or a Kleenex box, he probably would have reconciled his need to cause very real physical and mental harm to Gordie LaChance with some Oedipus-ial ideal of self-fulfilling prophecy, or perhaps some ancient Taoist belief in the forces of negative and positive charges, but alas he hadn't. Rendering this paragraph completely useless to our malicious villain. And the reader. (Uhhh...sorry).

"So what is the plan, again?" one of Ace's gang asked (yeah, not many going to rush off to college in that crowd).

"Plan? Like I'd tell you. You fucked up the plans last time, you asshat! I'll take care of the plans." Ace barked back. He'd learned, like many respected leaders in history, that treating your minions as shittly as possibly, as well as not explaining unnecessarily superfluous things like plans, creates undying loyalty and such like. Its a system.

"Hey your the one that let the kid train a gun on you! I'd 'a karate chopped it out of his hand!" the supposed-to-be loyal bastard minion replied, in a very screwing-up-the-system like fashion.

"Hey, I'm a God compared to you! I have imaginary elephant sized bull mastiffs! I've been laid in the last five days! So shut the hell up, bitch, or we might have to take this outside!" Ace retorted.

Considering the fact that the group_ was _currently outside, sitting on broken down patio furniture and drinking out of suspiciously unlabeled bottles, played no relevance at all to Ace's threat. And it was hot enough outside that the bastard minion let it go.

"Ummm...Mr. Ace, sir?" a small child, who had practically appeared out of nowhere, pulled at Ace's pant leg. He was a rather ugly child, which was rather unfortunate in such a small community where gene pools were scare.

"Do you have it?"

"Yes, one copy of The Book of the Dead" the unfortunately endowed child replied, pointing to a little red wagon strapped to a tricycle a few feet away.

"And you are sure that this book will allow full resuscitation of the dead? You are positive?"

"100% exacto mundo."

The corners of Ace's mouth pulled into a satisfied smirk.

No, Thing's did not bode well for Castle Rock.


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5

Baseball. America's favorite pastime. Gordy could remember back to when he was an anklebiter and Denny used to take him and Chris up to the city field, to throw around a ball.

It was a bright Saturday morning. Chris had called him a few hours ago, "lets hit up the old field, right?", and Gordy agreed to go because he couldn't think of an excuse not to. Anyway his parents had been awkwardly invited down to Lake Tahoe for a few days to a wedding between relatives that no one really knew. And just because he was a disappointment didn't mean that Gordie would burn the house down, so he'd woken up to an empty silence. There was a ten dollar bill and a single gold key left on the kitchen table.

They trudged up the hill, holding worn gloves and baseball bats. Chris was tossing the red stiched ball up and down, up and down. But as they traversed the tippy top of it, they were confused by the giant menacingly large fence that obscured the horizon. The field, the park, the swings, the slides—all hidden behind a gray criss-crossing monstrosity. Chris dropped the ball and jogged ahead, as if it was just some illusion, a mirage that would back down and apologize if you didn't look intimidated.

But the fence was very real. Chris gripped the wire mesh and angerly shook it, effusing a metal on metal grinding noise.

"There's a sign!" Chris called out, " Some shit about a new piping system blah blah sorry for any inconveniences blah blah. Fucking pricks."

In that moment, Gordie understood exactly how he felt. It's not that he didn't appreciate pipes, or regret the need for new ones, but fucking fences, man. Always fucking fences.

"What should we do?" Gordie asked, because after all, Chris always was the leader.

"Lets go drink all your old man's booze, as a protest for how much this town sucks," he replied.

Fair enough.

…..............................................

"You know what I could never understand?" Chris asked a few hours later, his words slightly slurred. They sat Indian style, trying to suck it in in the cramped tree house, passing a dusty bottle of Vodka back and fourth.

"What?" Gordie replied, laughing at Chris's increasingly obvious drunk-speech.

"Your parent's wedding pictures. I mean there's your Mom and she looks all pretty and dolled up and scared out of her mind and there's your dad, barely out of high school and already looking middle aged. And that creeper look in his eye, man, like he wanted to burn the whole place down."

"Yeah I know what you mean. My dad's hair's thinning but he's never lost that look." They both laughed but the comment wasn't really funny because it was so true.

"Why do you still live here, Gordie?" Chris asks, grasping Gordie's arm and staring intensely him in the eye, like it was the most important thing in the world that he understood exactly what Gordie had to say.

"I don't know, man," Gordie replied, trying to laugh off Chris's intensity because he didn't really want to think about the question, "Why are you still here?"

"I already told you, I'm a fucking nut case, a loser. But you, man, you and Denny. The fact that you two lived here almost justifies the entire pathetic existence of this place. And Denny's dead."

"Yeah Denny's dead," Gordie almost whispered. Fucking Chris, fucking town, why must it always come back to Denny? Denny never hung out in this tree house, why did Gordie feel like if he turned around, he'd be sitting there laughing and smiling? "What the fuck do you want from me? What am I supposed to say?" Gordie replied, slightly more loudly.

"I have no fucking clue. But not this, just not this." Chris replied, shaking his head. Taking another swig of the bottle.

"Not this? Why not this? I'm here and your here and we're together, why can't this be okay?" Gordie asked, almost frantically. They weren't making any sense, but he could feel a second meaning under his words that he desperately wanted Chris to understand and not understand.

For the rest of his life, Gordie would never understand why the next ten seconds occurred. He'd been incrementally noticing that with every single pull from the bottle, that the proximity between them had somehow been becoming smaller and smaller. He hadn't exactly minded.

There had been a momentary silence, when suddenly Chris had crossed that distance. In reality it was barely ten inches but for Caste Rock society it might as well have been ten miles.

There is something to be said about kisses. At least first ones. In retrospect it never really makes why they happen but at that exact moment in time, the fact that Chris's lips were touching, caressing and prodding his own is the only thing that made sense in the entire world to Gordie. He parted his lips slightly, instinctively turning his head for a better angle when Chris pulled him closer, lightly gripping the back of his head.

They sat like that for a while, kissing and embracing and bumping painfully into the wooden crates and tree house furniture, when Chris came up for air, saying, "Lets go to your room."

Gordie nodded meekly but hated how Chris was sliding down the tree house ladder, slipping out of sight. He rushed after him, panicking that with every single second the spell would be broken and Chris would wake up, realize he wasn't Cindy Collins and tell him to go fuck himself.

But as he jumped lightly onto the soft grassy ground, Chris was still there. He pulled Gordie into a kiss again, one hand gripping his forearm and the other lightly curled around the small of his back. They traveled like that, like a giant amoeba, awkwardly climbing the porch steps up to the front door, then on up the staircase to his room.

Once inside, Chris firmly shut the door. Now that he was back inside, surrounded by books and homework and little pieces of reality, Gordie suddenly became nervous. Like the fact of what they were doing had sobered him.

Chris was unperturbed, it would seem however, because there he was again, lightly sitting on the bed and pulling Gordie close to him.

Minutes passed into hours, buttons and zippers were undone, and Chris controlled it all. All Gordie could think about was his heartbeat but Chris took care of everything else.

He was always the leader after all.


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter 7

"_Hey, it's the Bossman, Bob Cormier here for another beautiful Friday morning in Portland!" _ the radio blared.

"C'mon Gordie, budge up man I'm freezing my ass off here" Chris whispered in Gordie's ear. Gordie shifted slightly, waiting for Chris to get comfortable before he curled up next to him, laying his head on his shoulder and his arm on the flat of Chris's stomach.

"_It's 90 K-L-A-M degrees and gettin' hotter! Up the ladder with another platter, it's Bobby Day with Rockin' Robin. It's BOSS!" _

There was a sharp intake of breath, and Chris lay motionless beneath Gordie's half asleep embrace. He wasn't buzzed anymore, and as the sun's rays washed through the paisley curtains on Gordie's window, Chris began to feel cold fear creep into his stomach. What he and Gordie had done, no matter how good it might of felt, was serious. Gordie moaned slightly, as if from a bad dream, and Chris found himself instinctively trying to comfort him, stroking his shoulder. In that second he knew that as soon as he got up out of bed, and was forced to really think about his actions, his world would never be the same.

"Gordie, honey, can you please go grab some milk?" Gordie's mother asked, carefully maneuvering around a giant tower of soup cans. Gordie thankfully accepted, she'd been trying valiantly to make small talk about school and football and they both felt incredibly awkward about the whole situation.

Gordie wouldn't have ever accompanied his mother on her errands, except he'd been hoping to run into Chris. Since the other night, he'd disappeared and Gordie was beginning to seriously worry. Besides the fact that he just really wanted to see him.

"Psst! Kid!" a voice interupted his thoughts. He looked up to see Vern's older brother Eyeball leaning against a shelf, squashing loaves of wheat and rye with his meaty shoulders.

"What?" he asked. Eyeball gestured with a crooked finger for him to follow. The thug had never personally communicated with Gordie before, and frankly Gordie was curious. He chose to follow him to a deserted aisle, the paper goods section, milk and his mother be damned.

"Ace wants to meet with you." he began.

"Oh tell that asshole that if he wants to talk with me--"

"Tonight. In the park by the old elementary school. He said come alone. Oh and if you don't something bad could happen to your little boyfriend Chris." Eyeball carelessly interrupted. He smiled at the look of fear in Gordie's eyes at the sound of the name Chris.

"See you tonight" he mocked. As he exited the aisle, he purposefully knocked over several stacks of paper napkins and plastic cutlery. As Gordie tried to breath, staring down at the misshapen lumps of napkins littered on the floor and the cutlery spewed out beside it, all he could think about is what Ace could do if he got his hands on his best friend.

In a daze he walked out the store, completely ignoring his mother's confused voice as he walked past her.

The moon shone high in the sky, a slight sliver of luminescent white on the background of black night. It was cold out and Gordie shivered as his sneakers crunched over dead leaves and twigs. He pulled his hoodie closer, folding his arms and trying to squeeze into himself to conserve heat. As he came closer, he noticed a warm yellow glow up ahead. There was a small campfire up ahead, and it didn't take a genius to guess that Ace and his gang were sitting around it, drinking beers and planning revenge on Gordie.

"Alright you douche bags I'm here!" he called out, trying to remember that day so many years ago when he was so fearless, hardening the expression on his face to a dismissive scowl.

"Gordie man?" Ace called back, laughing raucously. He rose to his feet when Gordie finally reached the fire. He looked older somehow. More rough. Gordie swallowed a gulp, feeling cold sweat dripping down his back.

"You don't have to look so scared, dude. I'm not here to fuck with you, really. I have a business proposition."

Gordie felt confusion. Didn't ace want to beat the crap out of him? He didn't relax his strained stance but he didn't interrupt either. At this, Ace continued.

"While I was in prison, I heard a lot of stories. Impossible stories. And I saw a lot of things that would have seemed impossible. But whatever because I'm not here to discuss semantics, essentially I have discovered how to resuscitate the dead." at this he pulled out a very large dusty brown book. Gordie's searching gaze was full of disbelief, to which Ace just laughed.

"But don't take my word for it. I'll show you."

At this cue, Eyeball rose from his chair from across the fire, circumventing the fire ring to stand beside Ace's seated form with what looked like the carcass of a chicken with it's head cut off in his grasp. Gordie wrinkled his nose with disgust but no one else seemed perturbed.

Ace took the chicken from Eyeball's hand, dismissing his minion with a wave, and turned from the circle. He removed a small vial from his jacket pocket and poured a few drops over the bird's still form, whispering a few muttled words. Suddenly, a guttural squawk sounded into the still night air. The white bloodied wings flapped violently and Ace dropped the gruesome form onto the dirt ground. It ran away into the brush behind them, it's hoarse breathing becoming quieter and quieter as it disappeared into the trees.

Gordie couldn't believe what he had just seen. He shook his head, his brain desperately searching for an explanation. But as the fire crackled menacingly, illuminating the leering expressions of Ace and his gang, the idea that a world existed in which men like Ace could resurrect dead chickens seemed more and more reasonable.

"What do you want from me?" he asked, his voice wavering slightly.

"Patience, man, I'm getting there. Your a smart kid, right? You can imagine how...profitable my newfound ability could be to the right people. My only problem is I've never tried it out on a human before and I'm not sure if quite the same effect will occur. Now I could just dig up any old body, but I thought to myself why do it for free? This is where you come in. For fifty bucks I am willing to try out my little trick on your old brother Denny. That way we both can win. You get your stupid brother back, for a reduced price, and I get fifty bucks. Sound swell?"

Gordie didn't speak for several seconds. He'd been dreaming about this very thing for so many years that the fact that Ace stood before him, holding out the golden possibility of returning his brother to him and righting his whole life again, didn't seem real. But it was real. So real and tangible right before his eyes.

"Why me?" he asked, barely above a whisper.

"Sentimental reasons. Your the first and last one to ever threaten me and live, Gordie. You deserve a reward for that." Ace leered. This response probably would have concerned Gordie had he not been so entranced with the proposition.

Denny alive again.

His parent's would return from their self chosen exile, they'd love him again. They'd be a family again.

For the first time in centuries, it felt like, Gordie could feel himself beginning to hope again. There was the light at the end of the tunnel in the form of Ace, leader of the Cougars, and he felt his feet carrying him toward it.


	7. Chapter 7

Chapter 7...Finally.

"Black socks they never get dirty the longer you wear them the blacker they get.

Some day, I think I will wash them but something keeps telling me don't do it yet

Not yet

Not yet

Not yet........."

"Dude c'mon. How many times can you sing one song over and over again? Seriously!" Chris moaned, "Okay, I get it, your seven---"

"Seven and a half!".

"Whatever! Fine! I get that your are seven and a half and regularly watch pink sweatered men sing gay little songs to you and thats your deal but can't you like...sing that shit in your head or something? Please?"

Three hours ago Chris Chambers liked kids. At least in the existential children-are-our-future-and-are-necessary-for-human-species-survival sort of way. And they were pretty cute and in a few years or so he could see himself fathering a couple and being a damn sight better Dad then his own was, as most kids born to dysfunctional screwed families imagine.

So when his brother's waitress girlfriend was forced to pick up the late shift and couldn't afford to pay the babysitter, he was happy to help out. Caroline was a nice girl, way too nice for Eyeball anyway, and what the hell else did he have to do on a Friday night?

That was before the coffee table's lacquer surface became the picture-for-Mommy's canvas.

That was before the macaroni got tossed on the floor.

That was before the ten and a half minute crying session about the macaroni getting tossed on the floor.

That was before the two and a half hour sing-a-long session. With the same five songs. Repeated over and over and over.

Now Chris could care less about the survival of the species, go fourth and be fruitful, begot begot be damned! Little kids are annoying! Now all of a sudden the philosophy of "children should be seen but not heard" made sense. Children should never be heard! Songs about socks and sheep and the Princess Pat should never be heard!

If Chris was ever split on the abortion issue, he was no completely pro-choice. In fact, if this kid repeated any songs involving socks again, he'd be on the side of the no choice all children should be aborted immediately! Act.

But Chris survived. Two and a half hours later, Caroline came to pick up her little sleeping boy, who thankfully finally stopped singing, and packed him away with his purple and blue dinosaur backpack in her tired looking pickup truck.

"Hey, Chris I just wanted to say thank you so much again" Caroline repeated, handing over a rolled up and sorry looking five dollar bill "and I know this isn't much but maybe you can take some girl out to the movies on it." She smiled, punching him lightly on the arm.

"Oh it was fine. The kid kept me company anyway so stop worrying about it." Chris lied reassuringly.

Caroline smiled again, and was about to turn around to set back toward her car in the driveway when she abruptly stopped.

"Oh Chris, you are still friends with that Gordie kid right?" she asked tentatively.

"Yeah yeah, what about him?" Chris replied carefully, his smile becoming fixed on his face as he felt a slight queasiness climb into his stomach at the tone of the concern in her voice.

"Look, I'm sure it's not that big of a deal but it's just that I've been seeing him hang around a lot lately with Ace's gang. I knew his older brother Denny in high school and he was a really good guy. No younger brother of Denny should be hanging around with Ace's gang."

"Yeah...yeah I hear you. Thanks, I'll talk to him about it and see whats up."

As she drove, her truck making a slight whining sound as it picked up speed, traveling down the street, Chris could feel the queasiness from before begin to grow into dread.

What the hell was Gordie doing hanging around with Ace's gang?

"Gordie?" Chris breathed, knocking on the tree house's marred and gnarled plank of a door. He could hear rustling inside and a few muttered curses. "Open up man..please?"

There was a few seconds of silence and then the door opened with a pop, Gordie's face appearing in the gap.

"What the hell do you want?" he asked, his eyes burning with resentment and anger.

"Look...I know I screwed up, okay? I know I kind of disappeared for a little while and didn't return your phone calls but I was freaked out! I mean what we did was....."

"We fucked. In fact we barely fucked, I don't think what we did could even constitute true fucking. And I needed you and you disappeared. Shows how much you care about me, huh?" Gordie spat back, rubbing the salt into the wound.

"Okay I deserve that. Fine. But will you please let me in? At least give me the chance to grovel and make it up to you."

Gordie looked like he wanted to punch Chris in the face while simultaneously kicking him in the balls. But he grunted begrudgingly and moved out of the way, allowing Chris to climb up into the tree house. As Chris scrambled his way up, and scratched a sizable cut on his arm on the edge of a misplaced nail, he could smell the slightly heady herbal scent of marijuana hanging heavy on the air.

"So you are a pot head now?" Chris scoffed, trying to wave the scent away from his nose as he sat down on an overturned apple crate.

"Sure, why not" Gordie replied, "Ace gets me a hell of a deal, apparently. And you know how my family is about savings."

"And what the hell is it with you and Ace anywa---"

"Save it. I don't want to hear you lecture me on some stupid shit that you don't have any idea about. So if thats what you are hear to do, then you can fuck off."

Chris inhaled a deep breath, trying to think of what to say. This all felt so wrong. Gordie was the only thing that he had in the whole world, why the hell were they fighting like this? He wanted to take it all back and he knew he had no right to judge Gordie on his relationship with Ace but he could feel it in his bones that if he didn't stop it, Gordie would get seriously hurt.

But there is no way to say that without sounding like an asshole. So Chris stayed quiet.

Gordie sat across from him, a joint trapped between his fingers and a hazy redness polluting his eyes. He didn't say a word, wouldn't even look at Chris, just taking another drag as the smoke swirled like a serpent up to the tree houses ceiling.

He looked like an asshole sitting there. Only assholes smoke pot, everyone knows real men drink beer. But he also looked like a very delectable asshole. His shirt rode up slightly allowing the smooth skin above his low hung jeans to peak out cheerfully and his hair looked all mussed up and sexy messy and he held the joint like he didn't give a shit about the world.

Suddenly, Chris jumped up and then he was moving across the small space and then he had his fist bunched in Gordie's jacket, forcing him up against the wall and then his lips were on his. He pressed harder and his teeth dug into Gordie's lower lip until he finally succumbed and then Chris ate at his mouth with all the raw tension and frustration and confusion that had been surrounding him for the last few weeks, clinging and clawing to his very skin and chocking his ability to think.

They kissed as their fingers tore at buttons and fabric was forced off of shoulders and jean zippers were ripped down and pant legs were kicked off of ankles. And they were lying on the tiny floor of the tree house, trying to ignore the splinters digging into their forearms and thighs and backs as they furiously kicked away crates and playing cards and consumed each other's lips, teeth, breath.

It was quick and furious and fast. And dead tiring.

And that's how Chris found himself lying on the floor of the tree house, a cotton checkered table cloth draped over him and no Gordie to speak of. He pulled on his clothes trying to think of what to do. He knew where Gordie had gone, to Ace. And he knew where Ace's hangout was. But if he went after him he would lose Gordie's already tenuous trust. But if he didn't he might find Gordie beaten up and bloodied, dropped off at the grocery store parking lot.

There was no one he could talk to. No one who could help him or even understand his dilemma.

So he pulled out the squashed cardboard package of cigarettes from his pocket, striking a match. As the smoke rose white into the night air, he resolved to leave it alone for the night. All he could hope was that Gordie still cared maybe the slightest bit about him. All he could hope was that he would come home.


End file.
